“Mornin’ mon petite,” Fezzo said when he spotted her. “You had a good night?”
“It was okay,” Nonie said, offering him a smile. She threw Margaret a glance.
“I thought you gave up that nasty habit.”
Margaret gave a dismissive wave of her hand that held the cigarette. “Oh, for Pete’s sake, it’s only one.”
“Yeah,” Fezzo said. “One after de other. Dat’s the third one you had since you been out here Margaret Ann.”
“Snitch,” Margaret said, and briskly walked out of the garage to the adjoining lawn and tamped out her cigarette in the grass. “Now, y’all happy? I swear some people need to mind their own beeswax.”
Nonie pasted her lips in a hard line, trying to keep a smile in check. “What’s on my agenda today?” she asked Margaret.
“Floors,” Margaret said, standing upright and brushing a hand over the front of her navy blue dress. As usual, she had a wide white belt cinching the dress at the waist. Her blue pumps tapped against the concrete as she made her way back into the garage.
Nonie groaned. Floors meant manhandling a utility buffer throughout the funeral home. The machine was so old and bulky she felt like she was driving a monster truck without a steering wheel every time she used it. She following Margaret to the garage.
“Isn’t there another job you can give me?” Nonie asked. “I hate doing the floors.”
“Well, you certainly can’t expect me to do them dressed like this,” Margaret said motioning to her dress and pumps.
So much for dressing down, Nonie thought. “What about Butchy?”
“He’s in de embalming room,” Fezzo said. “Your daddy’s got him scrubbing down all de machines and tools.”
“Where is Dad anyway?”
“In his office messing with paperwork,” Margaret said. “I’m going to be clearing out the reception area and do a bit of dusting.”
“What about Mom?”
Fezzo cleared his throat and put a bit more elbow grease into his scrubbing.
“She’s home with a headache,” Margaret said. “Said she’d be in later when she was feeling better.”
“You mean once the work’s all done,” Nonie mumbled.
Fezzo glanced at her with a little frown. Nonie knew he didn’t like her talking about her mother like that, but the truth didn’t always look like roses and gardenias.
“What was that, hon?” Margaret asked.
“Nothing,” Nonie said.
Fezzo winked at her.
“So where’s the monster truck?” Nonie asked.
“What monster truck?” Margaret said, glancing over her shoulder to North Street, which ran east of the funeral home.
“The buffer,” Nonie said.
“Oh . . .” Margaret said, looking a bit confused. “Why do you call it a monster truck?”
“Because it handles like one,” Nonie said with a sigh. “It’s as old as dirt, and it never goes in the right direction. I want to go straight, it hooks a left. I want to go left, it decides to go right. We need a new one.”
Margaret tsked. “No need spending money that doesn’t need to be spent now, missy. That old buffer works just fine. You’ve just got to get the hang of it.”
“Have you ever tried to get the hang of it?” Nonie asked.
Plopping a hand on her hip, Margaret shook her head. “Don’t be silly, young lady. Now go on and get about your business. The buffer’s where it always is. In the supply closet.”
Still grumbling, Nonie was making her way out of the garage and into the funeral home when Guy and Helen appeared, flanking her on either side.
“So when am I going to be on television?” Helen asked, clasping her hands together.
Nonie let out a sigh of frustration and held up a finger, indicating that she should wait. She went into the funeral home through the back door, which led into her father’s office. He was sitting at his desk, licking a finger and flicking through reams of paperwork.
“Hey, Dad,” Nonie said.
He glanced up at her, his reading glasses perched on the end of his nose. “Hey punkin’, what’s new?”
There was so much going on that was new that it would take a week for her to fill her father in on all the news. The problem was that it would be news he wouldn’t want to hear. Nonie too readily recalled the time she had told her mom and dad about seeing her grandfather at the foot of her bed and how upset they’d gotten. Not because they believed her but because they figured their beloved daughter was flying one branch shy of a cuckoo’s nest.
“Same ol’,” she lied as she headed out of his office and into the hallway. “Going to do the floors today.”
“Good, girl,” he called after her, then went back to his paperwork.
“Can we talk now?” Helen asked.
“Let’s go in the coffee room,” Guy said. “Nobody should hear you talking in there. They’re too busy doing their own thing.”
Nonie nodded and took a quick detour into the lounge then peeked back out into the hallway to make sure her father’s office door, which had a hydraulic arm, had closed after her.
“Margaret’s probably going to be coming down the hall any minute so let’s make this fast,” Nonie said, turning back to Guy and Helen.
“So tell me, tell me,” Helen said. “Is it real? Are they really going to use my house on TV?”
Nonie grinned. There was so much excitement and anticipation on Helen’s face it was contagious.
“It’s definitely a go, Helen,” Nonie said, and waited for a squeal of delight. Instead a look of confusion crossed Helen’s face.
“What’s that mean exactly . . . a go?”
“It means the producers want to use your house in one of their episodes.”
Helen gasped, clapped her hands and did a little jig, her cap of white curls bouncing with her. “Oh, my word, I can’t believe it! Thank you, thank you!”
Nonie chuckled. “I didn’t have anything to do with it. It was all you and Captain.”
“Did they catch them on video?” Guy asked.
“Captain showed up as a shadow in the shape of a man lying on the cot upstairs. Ms. Helen showed up as white and colored ectoplasm, and she generated some impressive EVPs.”
“I showed up as ectogasm?” Helen asked, suddenly coming to a halt. “Should I be embarrassed?”
“No, no,” Nonie assured her. “It’s called ectoplasm. It’s a stream of lights that show up in wavering lines either on video or on a still camera shot. It just means that some entity, that being you, pushed out enough energy to be caught on film that way.”
“Whew,” Helen said dramatically. “And what else is it you said I did that was impressive?”
“EVPs. That stands for electronic voice phenomena. They didn’t get everything you said upstairs, only a few words here and there, but the words were clear. They were very impressed.”
Helen clapped again. “Okay, okay, so what do we do now?”
“Well, my job with them is over now. I’m not sure when they plan to send a film crew out to your house, so I’d suggest that you go home and stay put. You wouldn’t want to miss them, right?”
“Oh, absolutely not!” Helen said. “I’ll go there right now, just to make sure.” She turned to Guy. “Are you coming with me?”
“I’ll catch up with you a bit later,” Guy said. “I’d like to talk to Nonie for a while.”
Helen cocked her head and gave him a wary look. “Just remember what we talked about.”
Guy gave her a forced smile, then Helen clapped her hands once more and blipped out of the room.
“That blipping thing takes some getting used to,” Nonie said. “I’m used to you doing a fade out.”
“It took a few tries when Helen was teaching me to get it down right. She told me to concentrate hard on where I wanted to be, and the first time I did, I wound up in the bayou, not far from the boat accident. The second time I found myself in the dairy aisle at Roy’s grocery.”
Nonie laughed.
“It’s not funny,” Guy said with a pout. “Both times I was trying to get to you.”
“Oh, stop taking yourself so seriously,” Nonie said. “Unless I’m missing something, you’ve got like what . . . eternity to get it down pat.”
“Yeah, well—”
“Nonie?” Margaret suddenly appeared in the coffee room, her face flushed. “There you are. I’ve been looking everywhere for you.” She glanced around the room. “Who were you talking to just now?”
“Uh . . .nobody.”
“Well, it had to be somebody because I heard you talking plain as the nose on my face.”
Nonie shrugged. “Must have been talking to myself. You know, making a mind list of what I needed to do while I’m here.”
“Have you even started on the floors yet?”
“Uh, no. I just got in here about five or ten minutes ago.”
“Those floors aren’t going to polish themselves.”
“I know, I know,” Nonie said, heading toward Margaret.
Margaret held out a hand. “Might as well stay put for now because Nate Lopez is here to see you.”
Nonie felt her a right eye give a nervous twitch. “Did he say what he wanted?”
“Do I look like your secretary?” Margaret asked. “He asked to see you is all I know. Probably has something to do with Anna Mae and Clara is my best guess. Anyway, instead of having him traipse all over the funeral home, I told him to stay put, and I’d come find you. He’s out by the reception desk.”
With that, Margaret marched out of the room, glancing back once or twice, evidently expecting Nonie to follow her lead.
Nonie did, hesitantly.
True to her word, Nonie found Nate near the front of the funeral home. He had a hand propped on the receptionist’s desk, leaning with one foot crossed over the other. When he spotted Margaret and Nonie, he immediately stood at attention. Nonie couldn’t help but appreciate how good he looked in his deputy’s uniform. His black, tousled hair, his gray-green eyes seemed to sparkle every time he looked her way.
“How’re you doing, Nonie?” he asked, hooking his thumbs in his front pockets.
“Okay. You?”
“Making it. Just wanted to come by and talk with you about a few things,” Nate said, then glanced over at Margaret, giving her a look that said, “If you’ll excuse us for a minute . . .”
Margaret ignored him and sat behind the receptionist’s desk, busying herself with pencils, paperclips, and pens.
“Is there somewhere we can talk in private?” Nate asked.
“Sure,” Nonie said. “Follow me.” She didn’t know why she hadn’t told Margaret to invite Nate back into the coffee room because that’s where she was taking him back to now. It was the only private place she could think of.
Nate followed Nonie dutifully. When they entered the lounge, Nonie pulled out a chair and offered it to him.
“Would you care for something to drink?” Nonie asked.
“No, I’m good,” Nate said.
“Well, have a seat at least.”
“I can’t stay for long. Still on duty. I just wanted to come by, ask you a couple of questions and give you an update on the Turner case.”
“Turner?”
“Yeah, you know, Anna Mae.”
“Oh, yeah, sorry.”
Nonie pulled out a second chair and sat at the table closest to him. “How can I help you?”
“Well,” Nate scuffed the toe of his boot against the floor as if embarrassed. “I was wondering . . .”
“Yes?”
“How did you know that Anna Mae was under that partially dried cement?”
Taken aback by the question, Nonie chewed her bottom lip for a moment. Her brain scuttled around at a hundred miles an hour searching for a plausible answer. If she told him the truth, they’d send the loony wagon for her. After a long moment, she said, “Well, Clara had asked us to come to her house to look around. See if we might spot anything that looked out of the ordinary that would give her a clue to Anna Mae’s whereabouts. We were about to leave the house when I thought of the backyard. Clara told me that she hadn’t been back there in some time so I figured it wouldn’t be a bad idea for us to take a look. That’s when we noticed the concrete. Clara didn’t know anything about it, so I went over to it and checked it out. Noticed that it was only partially dry. Clara seemed a little upset over it being there. Claimed it made her yard look terrible, which, she thought, reflected badly on her. So, Uncle Fezzo and I offered to clear it away for her. That’s when we found Anna Mae. Only we didn’t know it was Anna Mae right away.”
“Did you notice anything out of place or out of sorts in her house?”
“No, not a thing.”
“So nobody told you to go into the backyard to look for any particular reason?”
“No,” Nonie said. “It happened just like I said. Besides, it was only Clara, Uncle Fezzo and me. Who else would have told me to look in the backyard?”
“I don’t know,” Nate said. “Just asking.”
There was a glint in Nate’s eyes that Nonie couldn’t quite identify. “Anyway,” she said. “The rest is history. We called Sheriff Buchanan right away.”
“So you finding the ring in that pile of dirt was purely coincidental?”
“Of course,” Nonie said. “You know that. You were there at the time. I caught a glimpse of something shiny and brought it to the sheriff’s attention. You guys made the find. Why are you asking all these questions? Am I like a suspect or something?”
“No, nothing like that at all. In fact you helped us sew this case up quickly. If you hadn’t spotted that ring we might still be looking for Anna Mae’s killer.”
“You mean you found the person who killed her?”
Nate nodded. “When you identified the ring as looking like the same ones you saw on Stefren and Clarence Fontenot, we went over there to have a little chat with them. To make a long story short, it seems like Stefren didn’t take to kindly to anyone upsetting his mother so much. So he decided to take care of the woman who caused his mother so much grief. He waited until Clarence left the house, then went in search of Anna Mae. Found her at Roy’s Grocery. Waited for her to come out and followed her home. From the way he tells it, he warned Anna Mae to get out of town and she told him where she lived was none of his business, so he hit her over the head with a blunt object, right across her left temple. Not sure what he used yet. He won’t say. Doesn’t matter, though, with a bit of pressure, we got a full confession out of him. He claims he didn’t mean to kill her, just give her what for. You know, drive the message home about her leaving town. When he figured out what he’d done, he dragged Anna Mae into the backyard, got a shovel out of her shed and started digging a hole. Found out it wasn’t deep enough when he dumped her in it headfirst. He wasn’t strong enough to pull her back out, so he covered what was still showing with concrete. It was probably around that time his ring slipped off. Anyway, we found an empty sack of concrete in the same shed. He must have used the water hose next to the house to wet it down.”
“I can’t believe he spilled his guts that easily,” Nonie said.
“His mama was in on the interrogation, and she read him the riot act about telling the truth or else. I don’t think she was expecting him to confess. Not her precious boy. But the guy was so scared he started blubbering out of both sides of his mouth.
“How awful,” Nonie said. She shook her head, trying to shake the image of Anna Mae’s dirt-covered face.
“Yeah. Just like there’s some people who can’t hold their liquor, I guess there’s some people who can’t hold onto their tempers.”
Nonie couldn’t help but think of Guy trashing her apartment the last time he’d gotten upset with her. “I suppose you’re right.”
“So, we got the guy who did it, thanks to you. I just thought it was a bit coincidental that you went into the backyard, then caught a glimpse of that ring. I had to ask. Hop
e you didn’t take offense.”
“Not at all,” Nonie lied. It wasn’t that she’d taken offense. It was the fact that she’d had to lie about why she’d gone into the backyard in the first place.
Nate pushed the chair she had pulled out for him back under the table. “You know, Nonie, I feel sort of obligated to let you know . . . There’s word going on around town about you.”
Nonie felt her pulse quicken. “What word?” She got to her feet. “That I had something to do with Anna Mae’s death?”
“No. What’s being said is that you can see dead people. That you see and hear them.”
Nonie forced a chuckle. “Why on earth would anybody say something like that?”
“I don’t know. You know how people in a small town love to gossip.”
“Who told you that?”
“Old man Guidry over at the hardware store. Claims one of the guys who works for him is doing a project with you and swears he saw you talking to the dead.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Nonie said. She thought of Tatman and was glad he wasn’t around at the moment or Clay Point would have had two murders on its hands.
“Anyway, just thought, I’d give you a heads-up about that,” Nate said.
“I appreciate it . . . I think.”
Nate laughed. “Yeah, it’s not exactly like telling you you’ve won the lottery. But if you go walking around town and see people looking at you funny, at least you’ll know why.”
Great, Nonie thought. Just what I need.
“We’re still on for weekend after next, right?” Nate asked.
For a moment, his question didn’t register with Nonie.
“The festival.”
“Oh, yes, right. Definitely still on,” Nonie said and smiled.
Nate reached over and moved a strand of hair from her cheek. “Good. I’m looking forward to it.”
“M-me too, Nonie said, finding she had a hard time getting the words out. When Nate had touched her cheek, she felt heat flow over her body like a hot shower. It came so unexpectedly that it stole any further words from her mouth. His hands were large, soft to the touch, and his caress gentle.
Snapping to attention, Nonie tried giving the room an inconspicuous sweep, looking for Guy. Nowhere in sight. Even if he was around, he’d have only heard her accepting the date. He couldn’t read her mind, couldn’t feel the change her body experienced at Nate’s touch. If he could have, he’d really have something to bitch about.
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